Related papers: Molecular Cloud Fragmentation and Core Collapse
Stars generally form faster than the ambipolar diffusion time, suggesting that several processes short circuit the delay and promote a rapid collapse. These processes are considered here, including turbulence compression in the outer parts…
Star formation in our Galaxy occurs in molecular clouds that are self-gravitating, highly turbulent, and magnetized. We study the conditions under which cloud cores inherit large-scale magnetic field morphologies and how the field is…
The onset of star formation is set by the collapse of filaments in the interstellar medium. From a theoretical point of view, an isolated cylindrical filament forms cores via the edge effect. Due to the self-gravity of a filament, the…
Star formation is intimately linked to the dynamical evolution of molecular clouds. Turbulent fragmentation determines where and when protostellar cores form, and how they contract and grow in mass via accretion from the surrounding cloud…
Protostellar core formation is probably much more dynamic, and magnetic fields are probably much less important, than has been previously assumed in the standard model of low-mass star formation. This revised picture has important…
We systematically investigate how cloud-cloud collisions influence star formation, emphasizing the roles of collision velocity, magnetic field orientation, and radiative feedback. Using the first cloud-cloud collision simulations that model…
We investigate giant molecular cloud (GMCs) collisions and their ability to induce gravitational instability and thus star formation. This mechanism may be a major driver of star formation activity in galactic disks. We carry out a series…
We explore the structure of magnetic field lines in and around filaments in simulations of molecular clouds undergoing global, multi-scale gravitational collapse. In these simulations, filaments are not in a static equilibrium, but are…
This paper will review the basic concepts of gas-phase and grain surface chemistry of dense molecular clouds, where low mass and high mass stars form. The chemistry of cold pre-stellar cloud cores, where molecular freeze-out and deuterium…
Understanding the physics of how stars form is a highly-prioritized goal of modern Astrophysics, in part because star formation is linked to both galactic dynamics on large scales and to the formation of planets on small scales. It is…
A 2D dynamic model is utilized to investigate star formation in rotating filamentary molecular clouds (FMCs) amidst magnetic fields. The study reveals that the emergence of field stars is possible under both weak and strong magnetic fields…
We examine the effect of magnetic fields on star cluster formation by performing simulations following the self-gravitating collapse of a turbulent molecular cloud to form stars in ideal MHD. The collapse of the cloud is computed for global…
We perform numerical magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations of the gravitational collapse and fragmentation of a cylindrical molecular cloud with the help of the FLASH code. The cloud collapses rapidly along its radius without any signs of…
Substantial numbers of morphologically regular early-type (elliptical and lenticular) galaxies contain molecular gas, and the quantities of gas are probably sufficient to explain recent estimates of the current level of star formation…
Recent observational results for magnetic fields in molecular clouds reviewed by Crutcher (2012) seem to be inconsistent with the predictions of the ambipolar diffusion theory of star formation. These include the measured decrease in mass…
These lectures attempt to expose the most important ideas, which have been proposed to explain the formation of stars with particular emphasis on the formation of brown dwarfs and low-mass stars. We first describe the important physical…
Star formation is a complex process involving the interplay of many physical effects, including gravity, turbulent gas dynamics, magnetic fields and radiation. Our understanding of the process has improved substantially in recent years,…
We use magnetic collapse models to place some constraints on the formation and angular momentum evolution of circumstellar disks which are embedded in magnetized cloud cores. Previous models have shown that the early evolution of a…
We analytically investigate the modes of gravity-induced star formation possible in idealized finite molecular clouds where global collapse competes against both local Jeans instabilities and discontinuous edge instabilities. We examine…
We have performed fully 3D simulations of the collapse of molecular cloud cores which obey the logatropic equation of state. By following the collapse of these cores from states of near hydrodynamic equilibrium, we are able to produce…